The Need

Most everything we do in life requires electricity. Transportation, farming, homes, businesses, computing—they all necessitate the efficient movement of electrons from a power production source to an energy use site¹. Unfortunately, since Thomas Alva Edison first illuminated a Menlo Park street in 1879 – thus banishing the darkness 2 – the demands humanity has placed upon energy utilities have skyrocketed and consequently at least parts of our energy grid have become brittle and prone to failure. Moreover, the complexity of operating local, regional and national systems that are susceptible to cyber-attacks has made electricity a critical topic for national security.

World population has quintupled since the first sustained artificial light in the late 1800s. With more than 7.6 billion people 3 now teeming on our planet and all of us needing increasing amounts of energy 4, we cannot rely anymore on simple dynamo generators creating electricity and sending it straight to the desired location. On the contrary, our electricity grids are highly complex with numerous power sources (coal, gas, oil, nuclear, and renewables—biomass, solar, wind); switching and amplifying stations; transformers; above and below ground wiring; and storage batteries. Unsurprisingly, even considering conservative trends, our energy use is growing rapidly:

“In the New Policies Scenario, global energy needs rise more slowly than in the past but still expand by 30% between today and 2040. This is the equivalent of adding another China and India to today’s global demand.” 5

Moreover, our already highly electrified society will become even more dependent on charged electrons with new technologies. The Internet of Things (IoT), which requires cloud and edge computing at massive scale, is forecasted to exceed 75 billion devices connected to the internet by 2025 (up from 23 billion presently).6 Research into autonomous vehicles is rapidly approaching deployment stages. Testing underway in Phoenix, AZ and Pittsburgh, PA may be halted temporarily because of bad algorithms causing accidents or irregular policies, but other countries are not waiting around for the United States to perfect driverless cars. China is building cities specifically designed for autonomous vehicles.7 The Hyperloop – Elon Musk’s dream of accelerating people and cargo in a vacuum tube to near the speed of sound – is being tested in the United States and Europe.8

Population growth is also spurring construction of whole cities from scratch; examples abound in Asia. China plans on constructing a new city the size of Chicago (2.7 million people) with the latest technologies, and thus high energy demands.5 With support from Singapore, the Indian state Andhra Pradesh is building a new capital. “It will be a stupendous 7,235 square kilometres, 10 times the size of Singapore’s own 716 square kilometres.”9

The Risks

With so much riding on our need for energy, we must avoid costly failures. For example, when one author [TAC] worked in the semiconductor industry, the great Northeast Blackout of 2003 was tripped only a few miles from the production facility where he worked. The source of the power failure was overgrown tree branches that had fallen on a transformer. Normally, this would have remained a local issue, but the lead utility failed to react quickly enough to disengage the switches to other grids, thus causing a cascading, multi-grid failure for 50 million people from Ohio to New York to southeast Canada. People were trapped in subway cars and elevators for hours; cell phone service was disrupted for millions. 10 11

Perhaps even more dangerous than a lack of sensors on the grid and failed switches is the looming possibility of a cyber-attack targeting fragile points in the electrical system. Industry is spending billions in its attempts to strengthen cybersecurity of the brittle grid.12 “U.S. utilities will spend a cumulative $7.25 billion in security from now until 2020, with distribution automation assets as the core focus.”13Grid security is a major issue within the US Government; simulations of cyber-attacks are routinely done by groups such as DOE and DHS.1415

While a completely failure-proof grid may be impossible with the moving demand target caused by new technologies online and rapidly growing electricity demands, companies and government agencies must nevertheless do their best to anticipate and to prevent both accidental and nefarious situations before they happen. This presents a unique opportunity to engage newly accelerated capabilities of computers, especially artificial intelligence (AI).

The Opportunities

A core challenge with global electrical grids is their growing complexity. Growing exabytes of data from billions of IoT sensors, coupled with too-fast-for-humans reaction speeds required by increasing power demands, make a purely human-controlled electrical grid impossible. To sustain our growing needs, we must resort to a more digitalized approach.

There has been much talk recently about the so-called “smart grid,” defined as an electricity supply network that uses digital communications technology to detect and react to local changes in usage. 16 A smart grid has three major facets: data from sensors, computational power and optimized algorithms. Let us discuss the third point in detail.

Algorithm development has progressed in concert with Moore’s Law – the doubling of the number of transistors on a given semiconductor chip roughly every two years. In the early days of computers, there were a limited number of programming languages – Basic, Fortran, C/C++, Cobol, etc. Nowadays, companies such as Google develop their own proprietary operating systems as a routine course of smart business action. Increasingly, those algorithms are leveraging the power of AI.

While there are many definitions for AI, it can be defined simply as the ability of a machine to perform tasks commonly executed by a human. 17 AI is presently the hottest ICT 18 market sector. PwC estimates that global GDP will increase $15.7 trillion (a +14% boost compared to today) by 2030 as a result of AI. 19 20 Such a huge economic contribution cannot be understated, and organizations are investing aggressively accordingly. Venture capital funding pumped almost $5 billion into AI startups in 2017 alone. 21 AI has become a top corporate spending priority, with many hundreds of billions of dollars devoted to nabbing top talent and to securing algorithmic leadership. 22 There is a global race among governments to capture the title of AI world leader. 23

The reason for this flood of venture capital, corporate and government funding is that AI can solve problems far faster than humans, and in some cases solve problems that no human can. While we humans are smarter than any other living being on Earth, we are still rather dumb when it comes to absorbing and processing quickly vast amounts of data. The human mind is limited also to mostly working on a single task; despite some claims, we are generally horrible at multitasking. 24 Computers don’t have those limitations.

How might AI help the energy sector? We suggest there are two primary means by which advanced AI algorithms can improve efficiency, enhance safety, and improve the bottom line for energy utilities: grid optimization and cybersecurity.

Grid Optimization. To reap the benefits of the smart grid, AI will be a true necessity. “AI will be the brain of this future smart grid. The technology will continuously collect and synthesize overwhelming amounts of data from millions of smart sensors nationwide to make timely decisions on how to best allocate energy resources. Additionally, the advances made from ‘deep learning’ algorithms, a system where machines learn on their own from spotting patterns and anomalies in large data sets, will revolutionize both the demand and supply side of the energy economy.” 25

A challenge for utilities is maintaining consistent power. When there is a sudden increase in demand, the go-to reaction for utilities is to power-up ‘peaker plants’ that run on fossil fuels, generally natural gas. 26 Able to be turned-on within minutes of the detection of a demand spike – for example, due to increased air conditioning or heating requirements from a weather front moving through an area – peaker plants are unfortunately terribly inefficient and polluting. AI might assist in diminishing the use of peaker plants by leveraging advanced forecasting capabilities – for example, considering weather forecasts, regional demand cycles, and smart meter sensors in a single holistic package. The solution of such multidimensional problems is a strength of AI over humans. Such efforts could save utilities significant funds that they could funnel into further grid improvements.

One recent success story in using AI for energy optimization is that of Google’s deployment of algorithms to reduce electricity consumption in their server farms. Google has thousands of data centers worldwide to run search, store and process emails, etc. Those countless banks of GPUs 27 and memory storage systems consume tremendous amounts of electricity and tend to overheat. Because of their increasing presence and inherent inefficiencies, it is estimated that 2% of the world’s energy is consumed by data centers. 28 Both to save costs and to show-off its earlier purchase of the British AI startup DeepMind, Google decided to test AI in improving the cooling efficiency of their computer banks. “The autonomous AI control system initially led to a 12 percent improvement, which over nine months of operation increased to around a 30 percent improvement, with further improvements expected over time as its decisions are improved by having more training data. Google said in the long term that there is potential to apply the technology in other industrial settings.”29

Finally, AI can assist in converting incoming power to be acceptable to a grid. Every energy utility has a mix of power sources that it taps to provide its customer base their electricity. That mix is optimized based on price and, more recently, social perception for use of renewables. A challenge with multiple power sources – natural gas, oil, coal, nuclear, renewables – is to seamlessly integrate them all into the single grid. For example, wind and solar power sources require special converters to enable them to plug into the grid. “The high penetration of renewable energy systems is calling for new more stringent grid requirements. As a consequence, the grid converters should be able to exhibit advanced functions like dynamic control of active and reactive power, operation within a wide range of voltage and frequency, voltage ride-through capability, reactive current injection during faults, and grid services support.”30 AI could assist with energy conversion from renewables by leveraging deep learning to identify key performance optimization criteria and thus enable efficient uptake of the generated power into the smart grid.

Cybersecurity. Ironically, the very action of creating a smart grid makes it more vulnerable to cyber-attacks. Standardizing hardware and software, as well as creating a high degree of connectivity, enables hackers easier access to the grid through a greater variety of means. Programmed backdoors, firmware chip hacks, and even fake chips on motherboards 31 can all compromise the security of a given system.

Humans are inherently limited in what we can accomplish in cybersecurity. Our minds require rest, eating, drinking, etc.; cyber-attack bots require none of that. Thus, even though we might have the best intentions to be ever-diligent in the face of malware or phishing attacks, eventually we will slip up and allow nefarious actors access to sensitive computer systems.

Four years ago, seeing the rapid advances occurring in AI and knowing the challenges of human-centered cybersecurity, one author [TAC] forecasted that soon cybersecurity would enter the realm of “AI vs. AI,” i.e., AI algorithms would be both sources of attacks and defense. We are close to that time now. In the last few years, there has been a surge of interest in coupling the powers of AI, especially deep learning, to cybersecurity. 32 Thousands of companies globally now claim some form of AI in their cybersecurity offerings. Although it is debatable whether all these startups and corporate entities are truly using AI (some startups treat “AI” as a form of pixie dust—sprinkle it in a pitch in attempts to get funding), it makes sense to leverage the powers of learning algorithms to monitor and to react to cyber-attacks.

Ultimately, using AI for cybersecurity may not be just a choice but an imperative in the energy industry. In the United States, the complexity of the grid—with more than 8,000 power plants, 200,000 miles of high-voltage transmission lines, and 5.5 million miles of local distribution lines 3334—necessitates that even local utilities must think hard about how they monitor their systems for intrusive cyber-attacks.

The Means

So how do utilities leverage the power (no pun intended) of AI? One challenge for cash-strapped utilities is that AI experts are in such demand that a starting salary for a star AI programmer can exceed seven dollar figures35. Thus, a more cost-effective approach may be partnerships among established startups and corporate entities that already have in-house expertise in AI. One such partnership was announced recently between BootstrapLabs (a leading venture capital firm focused on Applied AI in San Francisco) and innogy SE (a leading Germany energy company):

“BootstrapLabs and the innogy Innovation Hub will coordinate globally to build the largest artificial intelligence community for energy ecosystems, and provide a combination of capital and support to Applied AI startups that reimagine the future of energy production, distribution and management across decentralized and interconnected energy services for consumers, machines, enterprises, and public sector agencies.” 36

Sebastian Niestrath, SVP Infrastructure Platform Ventures at innogy New Ventures LLC, further clarified: “The need to interpret massive amounts of data and use AI-supported algorithms for grid operations is becoming increasingly important, especially in Germany – where electricity from renewable sources has pretty much quadrupled during the last 15 years and where millions of solar panels are now installed on residential buildings.” Moreover, with the California Energy Commission unanimously voting 5-0 in favor of mandating that all single-family homes, apartments and condominium complexes of three stories or less require solar panels as of January 2020, California will quickly follow suit in the need for AI-supported algorithms for grid operations.

Further such engagements among all major energy players – including utilities, AI experts, and local/regional/national governments – will be imperative as grid demands and threats increase.

The Future

As our population continues to grow and more technology gets plugged into existing grids, it will be incumbent upon utilities to increase efficiencies to remain cost-effective and to avoid grid failures. Moreover, the growing threat from cyber-attacks will demand that power companies better protect their grids from nefarious actors. AI is one approach that can significantly help utilities move into this challenging world. Opportunities will be strong and risks could be minimized for those leaders who embrace the capabilities of advanced computation.

Authors

Thomas A. Campbell, Ph.D., is Founder and President of FutureGrasp, LLC (https://www.futuregrasp.com/), which advises organizations worldwide on trends and implications of emerging technologies.

Thomas is also serving as Special Advisor of BootstrapLabs, for Applied AI intellectual propriety development as well as assisting BootstrapLabs to expand its network reach and meet new opportunities into government sectors.

From February 2015 to August 2017, he was the first National Intelligence Officer for Technology (NIO-TECH) with the National Intelligence Council (NIC) in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI). Tom’s insights have informed senior policymakers, enabled millions of dollars in industry and academic funding, broken ground in multiple new research areas, and kept diverse groups abreast of the rapid pace and implications of technology change.

Dr. Campbell is focused on emerging & disruptive science and technologies, especially identifying, tracking, forecasting and implications. He has extensive experience in government, academia, and industry – nationally and internationally. More about Tom at this link here.

Nicolai Wadstrom, Founder & CEO, BootstrapLabs

Nicolai is the Founder, CEO and Managing Partner of BootstrapLabs, a leading venture capital firm, based in Silicon Valley and focused on Applied Artificial Intelligence.

Nicolai has spent all of his professional life building technology companies. He started his first business at the age of 15 in the late 1980s and in 2008 he founded BootstrapLabs to build a scalable investment platform focused on being the most valuable partner for entrepreneurs to build successful companies.

With decades of operational and entrepreneurial experience, and having invested in, advised, and mentored over 30 companies, Nicolai works with investment decisions, and post investment mentorship to support scaling for BootstrapLabs’ portfolio companies.

BootstrapLabs is a Venture Capital company focused on Applied Artificial Intelligence that combines Venture Capital and Human Capital to build companies that define our future.

BootstrapLabs unique Venture Builder platform provides all the resources top-tier entrepreneurs need to take their companies from innovation to a Scalable Product Market Fit and from there to growth.

Prior to BootstrapLabs, Nicolai among other things founded a cutting edge Enterprise Software company (in the ECM and EAI space), he also co-founded and IPO’d the first CFD/FSB trading platform in the Nordics, and pioneered Virtual Reality in 1996. More about Nicolai at this link.

The plant where [TAC] worked had diesel generators that kicked-in immediately upon the power loss to avoid thousands of dollars per hour of manufacturing losses. The plant manager nevertheless called FirstEnergy Corporation quickly to find out what happened and when power would be restored. Their unbelievable initial response was, “Don’t worry, we’re on it. We’re watching CNN right now to figure out what happened.”

BootstrapLabs is pleased to announce that our annual Applied AI Conference has been selected by Hewlett Packard Enterprise, in the article “The 16 AI and ML conferences you should attend in 2019” as one of the top AI events to attend next year.

This recognition is the latest in a series of recommendations we have received from many AI experts, companies, and journalists, including Business Insider last year.

VC investment in artificial intelligence and machine learning doubled from $6 billion in 2016 to $12 billion in 2017 (Source. KPMG), and investments are at an all time high in the space.

With the AI market projected to grow over 20 fold in the next 10 years to $3 trillion annually, we believe Applied Artificial Intelligence represents one of the major wealth creation opportunities of this century.

If you want to increase your knowledge and connections in the industry, become an AI champion inside your organization, or find new career opportunities, the Applied AI Conference 2019 would definitely be a great event to attend. Discount tickets and more information are available on our conference web page – link here.

BootstrapLabs also has a limited number of sponsorship opportunities available for select partners; you can learn more about these opportunities and request more information at this link.

Below you can find the article from Hewlett Packard Enterprise:

The 16 AI and ML conferences you should attend in 2019

If you want to grow your career, consider attending one of these great artificial intelligence and machine learning conferences for IT pros. Whether you’re a manager, developer, or researcher, doing so will help you meet expert colleagues and improve your skills.

AI is as hot as a laptop with a broken fan—so scorching that some conferences promise to exclude recruiters. As such, there are plenty of organizations motivated to share AI and machine learning information. This overview aims to help you identify the conferences that are worth your time and meet your needs.

At first glance, you could use a background in data mining just to sort through all the events that have “artificial Intelligence” in their titles or include AI conference tracks. I winnowed down the offerings based on the quality of speakers, attendees, and networking opportunities. However, your own needs are the ultimate filter: Are you a programmer looking to increase your skills? An executive looking for competitive insights? A researcher looking to share ideas? A tech recruiter looking for prospects? A prospect looking to dodge recruiters? Some conferences are large and multifaceted enough that nearly anyone can get something out of them. Others appeal only to researchers in subspecialties.

The list below aims to give you enough details to make an informed decision. It is ordered by date, with gold stars for the conferences I think merit close attention. The conference list starts in late 2018, in part because few organizations have published details about fall 2019 events; the coming-soon events provide enough information for you to decide whether they should be on your schedule for next year.

We are proud to announce our partnership with innogy New Ventures LLC, part of the innogy Innovation Hub and an affiliate of innogy SE, a leading German energy company and the third largest utility in Europe with annual revenues of €43 billion (2017).

The Energy sector is often overlooked by technology-focused investors that deem it too complex, slow, and concentrated. At BootstrapLabs, we understand that Energy, and its supply-chain infrastructure, is powering our modern way of life, including all the technology that we have come to love and rely upon each and every day. Not having a safe, secure and always available source of electricity is not an option and we need to put our best minds on the problems facing utilities, if we are to solve some of their major challenges in time.

innogy Innovation Hub and BootstrapLabs share a common vision that AI will be a key pillar to ensure that utilities successfully transition into the future. As part of our long-term strategic relationship, innogy New Ventures will invest an initial sum of $5 million in BootstrapLabs’ Applied AI Funds, and together we will coordinate globally to build the largest artificial intelligence community for energy ecosystems, and provide a combination of capital and support to Applied AI startups that reimagine the future of energy production, distribution and management across decentralized and interconnected energy services for consumers, machines, enterprises, and public sector agencies.

“As a venture capital firm focused on Applied AI, we believe that the advances made from deep learning and machine learning algorithms will revolutionize both the demand and supply side of the energy economy. With about 22 million customers and activities in 15 countries, innogy is the perfect partner to help us validate use cases quickly and scale our venture investments globally,” said Nicolai Wadstrom, Founder and Managing Partner of BootstrapLabs.

https://bootstraplabs.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2018/10/Header_AI_Conference.jpg13672048Benjamin Levyhttp://bootstraplabs.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2018/08/Bootstrap-website_white_logo.pngBenjamin Levy2018-10-03 07:01:362018-10-03 09:11:37innogy Innovation Hub and BootstrapLabs to form a Partnership for Investments in AI and Energy

We are pleased to announce that Luigi Congedo, Principal at BootstrapLabs, has been included in Forbes 2018 list of 30 Under 30 for his contributions to Technology & Venture Capital. In the past four years at BootstrapLabs, Luigi has connected with thousands of start ups in both Silicon Valley, Italy and the world and has focused his work primarily on investments within the Applied Artificial Intelligence space.

At 29, Luigi has proven to be passionate and driven in a space lead by innovators who are changing the world. Luigi shares, “The last few years have been a wonderful experience for me. I have learned so much in Silicon Valley and hope that my work continues to reflect my commitment to excel here.”

BootstrapLabs and Position A Partners jointly released the following this morning:

SAN FRANCISCO, December 20, 2017 (Newswire.com) – BootstrapLabs, a leading early-stage venture capital firm focused on Applied Artificial Intelligence, and Position A Partners, a specialized investment, product innovation and corporate development firm, are partnering to offer founders a life-cycle approach to successfully build and scale companies that solve the hardest Artificial Intelligence and Cyber technology challenges in areas such as autonomous vehicles, identity management, data and transaction integrity, critical infrastructure, robotics, healthcare and government.

The world is fast becoming digital, powered by software, data, infrastructure, and increasingly, artificial intelligence. Six years ago, oil firms accounted for six of the top 10 most valuable companies worldwide. Today, only one oil firm remains in the top 10, and six technology companies (Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Amazon and Alibaba) represent 70 percent of their total market capitalization. This represents the biggest sector shift in modern history, creating major opportunities for new market entrants, but also creating major threats to the core pillars of modern society.

“Cyber, in particular, poses a massive challenge to the very fabric of our society, and few firms are as well positioned as BootstrapLabs and Position A to uncover emerging innovation in cyber, artificial intelligence and next-generation computing that will address this trillion-dollar opportunity,” said Dr. Tom Campbell, special advisor to BootstrapLabs, founder of FutureGrasp LLC and former National Intelligence Officer for Technology at the National Intelligence Council, ODNI.

According to Cybersecurity Ventures cybercrime damages are expected to cost the world $6 trillion annually by 2021, up from $3 trillion in 2015, and corporations’ budgets for cyber alone are expected to grow to $1 trillion by that same date. Ransomware attacks have been spreading like an epidemic since 2016, and 2017 already recorded $5 billion worth of damages, touching even the most sophisticated and technologically advanced corporations, institutions and nation states.

“Software systems and the infrastructure on which they run are getting increasingly complex, and interconnected. With the recent advances in artificial intelligence, these systems are exponentially more challenging to build, manage and secure. It takes deep domain knowledge, expertise, ingenuity, passion and vision to solve these complex problems and I could not think of a better partner than BootstrapLabs to do this with,” said Herb Kelsey, partner at Position A Partners and former chief architect for a U.S. DoD mission support agency.

Together, the firms combine access to value-add capital and a joint community of some of the world’s best AI and Cyber experts in computer vision, NLP, NLU, DL, mapping, robotics, cybersecurity and blockchain. Founders will be able to accelerate their product-market fit discovery, vet and hire top talent faster, close scalable revenue opportunities sooner and strategically plan exits to some of the group’s close strategic partners or to the public markets.

“There is no need for founders to re-invent the wheel with each venture; a certain product and technology may be unique, but the way to build and scale a company to success isn’t. Together our firms bring a unique combination of proven execution methodologies, skills, deep industry knowledge and resources so that founders can take their venture from early disruptor to market leaders in a fraction of the time, dilution and risks it usually takes,” said Darr Aley, founder and managing partner of Position A Partners.

“After spending decades building, investing and scaling technology companies, I know firsthand how critically important it is for founders to pick the right partners, which is why I founded BootstrapLabs. We have known Position A Partners for years, and as fellow operators and founders, we have the deepest respect for the work they do, and I am very excited to bring together our respective strengths to address some of the greatest opportunities of our time,” said Nicolai Wadstrom, founder and CEO of BootstrapLabs.

Over the years, BootstrapLabs has cultivated a world-class community of 38,000 AI experts, founders, executives, developers and investors to fuel its high-quality deal-flow, provide access to top-tier talent and secure early customers for its portfolio companies. Over 2,000 professionals have attended its Annual Applied AI Conferences, quarterly Insiders Series and monthly workshops. The group also publishes a very popular Applied AI Digest newsletter that is read by more than 4,000 people each week.

About Position A Partners

Position A is a specialized investment, product innovation and corporate development firm working with disruptive technology companies in AI, IoT, Robotics, Autonomous and Electric vehicles, Transportation (all forms), Global Supply Chain and Cyber. The firm works with some of the most important engineers, scientists and business talent of our generation to solve the world’s hardest technology problems that are impacting its network of Private Equity, Family Offices, University Labs, Venture Groups and Nation States partners.

As a catalyst for innovation development and technology adoption, Position A leverages its direct access to critical infrastructure, deep knowledge of the regulatory environment, as well as expertise in forming public/private partnerships to accelerate global product adoption, revenue creation and exits for its clients.

Media Contacts:

BootstrapLabs Group LLC | Email: info@bootstraplabs.com

Position A Partners LLC | Email: darr@positionapartners.com

https://bootstraplabs.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2017/12/BootstrapLabs-and-Position-A-Partnership_800x400.png400800markmhttp://bootstraplabs.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2018/08/Bootstrap-website_white_logo.pngmarkm2017-12-20 08:49:402017-12-28 13:30:32BootstrapLabs and Position A are Partnering to Solve the World's Hardest Technology Challenges in AI and Cyber

We are very pleased to announce that Dr. Thomas A. Campbell, a recognized analyst and researcher in emerging and disruptive technologies, has joined BootstrapLabs as a Special Advisor.

“I have known Tom for a few years and I am very excited to have him join BootstrapLabs as a special advisor. His deep domain knowledge and expertise is an invaluable resource to our core mission to address some of the hardest technology challenges and opportunities facing our society for years to come.” Nicolai Wadstrom, Founder and CEO of BootstrapLabs.

Tom is the Founder & President of FutureGrasp, LLC, which advises organizations on trends and implications of emerging technologies. Before that he was the first National Intelligence Officer for Technology (NIO-TECH) with the National Intelligence Council (NIC) in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI). Tom established and managed liaison relationships with academia, industry, and others to ensure a comprehensive understanding of technology and its intersection with global military, security, economic, financial and energy issues.

Prior to his government service, Tom was Research Associate Professor and Associate Director for Outreach with the Institute for Critical Technology and Applied Science (ICTAS) at Virginia Tech for over six years. He led corporate outreach and facilitated large, multi-principal investigator (PI) program and proposal developments in interdisciplinary areas.

Tom holds a Ph.D. in Aerospace Engineering Sciences from the University of Colorado at Boulder.

The Autonomous Corporation

We stand in front of the 4th and largest wave of the industrial revolution, powered by AI and Data. This is the biggest opportunity so far for innovation and entrepreneurship, and every single industry will be disrupted and redefined by companies that are not yet even born.

With the AI market projected to grow over 20 fold in the next 10 years to $3Tn annually, we believe Applied Artificial Intelligence represents one of the major wealth creation opportunities of this century.

Any system that is not learning will soon die, and applying AI to new or existing systems will extend and accelerate societal improvement.

AI-driven systems will soon be able to build better, more efficient products that scale and solve problems in ways that have not been possible before. While everyone is talking about Autonomous Vehicles, we want to talk to you about the Autonomous Corporation, where most actions will be automated, decisions autonomously taken and where outcome will be learned from to continuously improve results. We are moving away from the world of Automated Systems and stepping into a world of Autonomous Systems.

The power of AI is about leveraging technology and big data, automating repetitive mechanical tasks, capturing more data from the real world, and ultimately empowering humans with actionable intelligence, rather than replacing them, and finally changing our world for the better!

Join us @ BootstrapLabs HQ for an exciting evening with the leaders of the Autonomous Revolution!

https://bootstraplabs.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2016/06/AI-is-eating-the-world-bots-bootstraplabs.png11582086luigicongedohttp://bootstraplabs.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2018/08/Bootstrap-website_white_logo.pngluigicongedo2016-06-16 17:51:062017-01-19 11:21:09AI IS EATING THE WORLD

May 1, 2013, Seoul, Korea and San Francisco, California — Silicon Valley-based BootstrapLabs, and Malaysia-based MAD Incubator today announce the formation of BootstrapAccelerator Asia. As a Southeast Asia-focused Tech Startup Accelerator with a Silicon Valley Fast Track™ for its most promising candidates, this is a first.

MAD Incubator and BootstrapLabs share the philosophy of “Making a Difference” by empowering entrepreneurs to build global startups and believe that Southeast Asia will be a hotbed for disruptive startups in the future. Southeast Asia is the third-largest-growing economic zone in the world with a population of one billion and a market potential of US$ 30 trillion by 2020.

“What is developing in Southeast Asia is thrilling. MAD Incubator has been doing a fantastic job locally, educating, guiding and mentoring entrepreneurs and partnering with them to empower startups to grow into global companies makes them the perfect partner to achieve our joint vision,” said Nicolai Wadstrom, founder of BootstrapLabs.

Andrew Wong, CEO & Founder of MAD Incubatorechoes these sentiments adding that “our partnership with BootstrapLabs creates a different offering than other Silicon Valley accelerators operating in Southeast Asia. By combining aspects of the local culture and disposition with Silicon Valley execution we are creating the accelerator model of the future.”

BootstrapAccelerator will focus on early-stage capital efficient startups that leverage the speed of internet distribution and the scalability of cloud infrastructure. Selected startups will receive a substantial package of cash grants and other perks valued at over US$35,000. Additionally, the most promising teams will take part in BootstrapLabs’ Silicon Valley Fast Track™, and even relocate to Silicon Valley.

“The Malaysian Multimedia Development Corporation (MDeC) will support this initiative in Malaysia, which will catalyze domestic ecosystem expansion to the world. We are thrilled to have BootstrapAccelerator operating out of Cyberjaya and will a range of support through various programs, into the future,” said Dr Karl Ng, Director of Innovation Capital of MDeC’s Innovation Capital Division.

In short, “BootstrapAccelerator Asia is designed to make a difference and is the first and only Accelerator of its kind in the region and possibly globally,” according to Benjamin Levy, Partner at BootstrapLabs, who will be speaking tomorrow at beLAUNCH conference in Seoul alongside Christine Tsai of 500Startups, Bernard Moon of SparkLabs, and David Lee of Kstartup.

About BootstrapAccelerator Asia: BootstrapAccelerator focuses on early-stage capital efficient software startups that leverage the speed of internet distribution and the scalability of cloud infrastructure, regardless of their vertical or segment. BootstrapAccelerator brings together a Glocal (Global+Local) network of corporates, mentors and investors, as well as local government agencies, which bring critical support in everything, from ideation to executing game changing startups.

BootstrapAccelerator is a 12-month program, divided into three stages: Ideation, Incubation and Acceleration. As every startup is different, BootstrapAccelerator will not run cohorts, but will evaluate applicants on a monthly basis and enroll people / startups at the relevant stage. BootstrapLabs is able to offer the most promising startups from BootstrapAccelerator a global fast track opportunity to becoming a global company, through the Silicon Valley ecosystem.

About BootstrapLabs: BootstrapLabs is a Silicon Valley-based Seed+ Venture Capital Fund that invests in foreign startups to relocate to Silicon Valley, and build global companies. They employ an entrepreneurial and very hands-on approach to execution and help startups tap into the opportunities Silicon Valley presents.

Since 2009, BootstrapLabs has helped foreign startups such as Prezi, Witsbits, AudioDraft and Zerply connect and relocate to Silicon Valley, while maintaining their roots.

Today these startups are valued at $150M+, employ more than 150 people, and have received over $25M in funding.

MAD (Make a Difference) Incubator is the largest private incubator and most active entrepreneur development platform in Malaysia, having helped more than 300 startups since its inception in 2009. MAD was founded by Andrew Wong on the premise that every technopreneur deserves to have a chance to succeed and experience technopreneurship to the fullest.

MAD serves only the best programs and support services, and is designed to incorporate diverse technopreneurship experiences, ensuring that startup technopreneurs are able to gain better knowledge to succeed in the technopreneurial world.

About MDeC: Multimedia Development Corporation (MDeC) directs and oversees Malaysia’s National ICT (Information & Communication Technology) Initiative, the MSC Malaysia (formerly known as the Multimedia Super Corridor in Malaysia). MDeC is owned and funded by the Malaysian Government, and serves to advise the Malaysian Government on legislation and policies, develop MSC Malaysia-specific practises. MDeC also promote MSC Malaysia locally and globally, as well as support companies which are locating to and located within MSC Malaysia.

The first thing that comes to mind when referring to a Mentor is someone that has the experience and wisdom of having tried – and sometimes failed – before you and can help you, not in giving you the solution but in helping you figure it out.

Today, every worthy accelerator is boasting a very long list of mentors on their website ranging from famous local or international figures, successful startup founders, venture capitalists, senior executives at large corporations, consulting firms, lawyers, teachers, etc.

I can only applaude all of them for taking the time out of their busy lives to share their wisdom with startup founders and the community at large using a “paying it forward” mentality. Yet, I can not help but wonder what kind of “Mentorship” one can really deliver when hardly spending any time with the startups in question.

I too have taken part in many of these mentoring sessions and tried my best to give valuable or insightful advice but again, what effect did those have on the startups or founders that received them, did they happen to help or confuse them…not sure…one thing is certain though, it was likely too brief to be really valuable and have a long lasting positive impact.

It goes without saying that the quality of mentors varies greatly and some, while well known, might not have the “DNA” to provide you with the advice that is right for you or your company at that specific moment. Maybe it is because I studied finance and was a FINRA certified Investment Banker at some point in my life but it is a well known fact that any financial advisor is forbidden from providing specific investment advices, unless he has gotten to “know his customer” first. This means doing its due diligence, gaining as much information as possible about the person, its current assets, family situation, health, risk tolerance profile, upcoming life milestones, etc.

The equity founders own is likely their most valuable assets (or they sure hope it will become) and should therefore be managed with great care. I am of course not advocating that all startup mentors get some sort of accreditation from a third party authority of some sort. But I am advocating that true mentors should spend time with their startups and founders and get to know them intimately. Only then would they be in the best position to, over time (and that means more than an hour or two over a 3 months period), provide valuable insight and advice that are tailored to the needs of that specific startup and/or founder.

In the days of Telemachus and until recently, it was the norm that a mentor would be assigned to an apprentice for the better part of his youth and even sometime long after, forming a strong lasting bound. between the two parties. As a Partner @bootstrapLabs I certainly appreciate, and take full advantage of the fact, that things are moving a lot faster these days. Be it in life in general or the pace at which one can launch a startup, build an MVP, test distribution channels and acquire customers but I refuse to believe that true mentorship, which often creates life long benefits for the apprentice and mentor, can be imparted in a single “shot” or even over the course of a traditional accelerator program.

According to Wikipedia: “Mentorship is a personal developmental relationship in which a more experienced or more knowledgeable person helps to guide a less experienced or less knowledgeable person. However, true mentoring is more than just answering occasional questions or providing ad hoc help. It is about an ongoing relationship of learning, dialog, and challenge.”

On the positive side, the creation of accelerator programs around the world has provided a standard framework to empower thousands of people to become startup mentors and share knowledge, experience, idea. This in itself could very well carry the seed of a true Mentorship renaissance. But as I pointed in the title of this blog post, founders should be able to read between the lines and take mentors access of accelerator programs for what it is, access; an opportunity to start building a mentor/apprentice relationship with someone they would not have met otherwise.

The best (and sometime serial) mentors are always overwhelmed with request from apprentices and getting their attention will always be a challenge. Yet I cannot help thinking that this is just a good natural filter and only the most percistent, perseverant founders will success in securing a true mentorship!

If you are one of those founders that went through an accelerator program or a serial mentor (you know who you are), I would love to hear your thoughts on the topic so feel free to drop a line or two in the comment section below. Thank you!